


Gods and Punks

by Liliriu



Series: Gods and Punks [1]
Category: Cthulhu Mythos - H. P. Lovecraft, Dream Cycle - H. P. Lovecraft, LOVECRAFT H. P. - Works, Neon Genesis Evangelion
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Happy Ending, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Romance, Tags May Change, stoner randolph, subtle academia parody, trashiness, weird randolph/harley dynamincs but not as fucked up as in other depictions
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-30
Updated: 2021-01-05
Packaged: 2021-03-08 19:49:30
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 10,526
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27272206
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Liliriu/pseuds/Liliriu
Summary: An ex dreamer is weary of adulthood and modern society, which eventually leads him to cross paths with a decently attractive mystic.~~~~Sorry that the tags and description keep changing. This is a The Statement of Randolph Carter reimagination. Was originally conceived as a Lovecraft-Neon Genesis Evangelion crossover, but is turning more into a Lovecraft fic with Evangelion characters as guest stars. Unfortunately, the "happy ending" tag applies only to the Lovecraft characters.Warnings: sex (not that much), political incorrectness (quite much), death (later chapters), mental health issues. Mainly, don't read if you care about stuff like tastefulness.
Relationships: Ikari Shinji/Nagisa Kaworu, Randolph Carter/Harley Warren
Series: Gods and Punks [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2097219
Comments: 4
Kudos: 4





	1. Randolph Knows all About the Cool Kids

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am a little insecure about this one. The main character is Lovecraft's Randolph, but then it isn't. While _I love him_ , he might be just a little too idiosyncratic? I would actually appreciate some constructive criticism...! Thanks<3
> 
> Also, the title is a song by Monster Magnet.

I wake up one morning and realize four things:

  1. I am not a child anymore.
  2. At thirty-fucking-two, it was about time I’d realize that.
  3. A diet which consists solely on Cheetos and chocolate chip cookies might, apparently, cause you acne and/or to grow a belly.
  4. In my case it is “and”.



_What-have-I-done-with-my-life._

I try to remember. I count with my fingers:

  1. Finished high school like a normal loser, but unlike the smart losers, who became scientists and such, I tried to become a science fiction writer.
  2. After a few years of failing miserably, enlisted into the army and was shipped to the Far East to serve my country. Came back with a pretty PTSD thank you gift from it, crying for my mommy.
  3. Started a new life in academia, finished a B.A in Anthropology at the Miskatonic University. Quote right as I should had been starting my M.A thesis, so this time I would definitely become a fiction writer.
  4. Managed to publish a novel, and it actually sold. _And_ it became popular. Popular among normal people, that’s it. Among this disgusting bunch of ugly, anti-vaccine, racist _breeders_ , who wrote about it in their blogs and their vlogs and their _twitters_ , that’s it. Cried for a week and swore never to write again.
  5. Worked until present day in stupid dead-end jobs, right now as a security guard, living every day in fear someone I know might see me and recognize me, enduring it by consuming industrial amounts of weed.



What have I done with my life, indeed.

But it could had been worse. Had I had some specific goals or expectations, then the contrast between them and reality would had truly been a disappointment. This way, I am just a regular failure. I am exaggerating, of course. Not that I’m not a complete failure, but I was not completely devoid of desire to achieve anything; I did want to become a novelist, and then a war hero, and then an anthropologist, and then a novelist again, and then a corpse. Just kidding, about the corpse thing. A sexy mummy, maybe. Anyway, I did not have “childhood dreams,” at least not of the figurative kind that people usually mean when they say that. After all, why would I need them, when I had plenty of dreams of the literal kind; in which I would roam among turquoise hills and marble cities, diamond gates and violet oceans, ivory mosques and enchanted forests, and all such places. See, after having had this type of experiences, night after night, during my whole childhood and until somewhere in my twenties, only to lose them afterwards… I guess it does kind of explain why I may come across as a little bitter? Oh well, inside my head all this shit makes sense, at least.

The thing is, I am _weary_ of those times. I am weary of bills and laws, of Instagram and elections, of Kardashians and caring for my health, of pollution and environmentalism, of liberals and conservatives, of scatological humor and scatological “art,” of Internet and sports, of sport cars and spirituality, of alternative medicine and all the people who used to be my friends having children now, of positivity and growing up, of “why don’t you find yourself a nice girl Randolph? Or whatever you’re into haha?” and “just listen to your body, _dear Randolph_ , you know, try some meditation. Some feng shui, some crystals. Just relax, you know, _it’s all about quantum mechanics_!”

I solemnly swear, by the merciless gods of my ancestors, to brutally strangle the next excuse for a person, whom I will hear uttering the _distasteful words_ “quantum mechanics”.

***

I call my boss and quit my job. Yeah, actually call him, because I’m a nice and polite person like that. Believe it or not, I am. Even if I might have _occasionally_ used adjectives to describe some coworkers of mine, which some people might see as “insults,” but which I prefer to see as “very accurate descriptions.” Right in their stupid faces, that’s it. And I refuse to apologize, as I was merely providing them a valuable service by informing them of what’s true. Anyway, I call him, quit my job, and proceed to make something of my life. I start that by smoking some weed, to help me think, that’s it. The thinking brings me to the conclusion that I must get off the weed. So next thing, I clean my house. That way I also get rid of a meaningful part of my weed stock, because I need to smoke it in order to cope with the fact that I’m fucking cleaning.

***

Next day, I wake up with a migraine from hell, but I actually drink fucking coffee like a good responsible boy, and actually get rid of the weed that is left; like, “throw-it-to-the-garbage” get rid of. I am prepared to also throw my stock of snacks, but then I remember that I must undergo drug rehabilitation today, so I should better have something to eat.

“You do understand that you are not undergoing any fucking “ _drug rehabilitation_ ”, because cannabis is not physically addictive, right?” asks my imaginary frenemy, Randy.2, pointing at my belly and my acne, as I shut my ears and sing “la-la-la,” which he rolls his eyes at and goes where imaginary people go whenever you’re not using them.

So I open a bag of chips and wonder how much time does it take to get off weed, but I have no idea so I decide it will take one day. What am I going to do in the meanwhile? I stare at the shelves where all my true loves lie: Old Poe and Carroll and Keats, older Shakespeare and even older Ovid, less old Tolkien and Asimov, and finally my contemporary lovers: Gibson, Rushdie, and my sweet, sweet Gaiman. I stare, tempted, at my baby: the Poe’s Complete Works tome with the shiny, ugly cover art, that I bought myself once as a compensation gift when my laptop broke; but my fingers are all greasy and I don’t want him to see me like this, so I end up binging Berserk again. It is a strange experience because I didn’t remember that it was so gay, and it makes me cringe in a not unenjoyable way.

I pass a pleasant day getting off the drugs and alternatively eating junk, sleeping, watching Berserk and masturbating to the thought of Griffith fucking Guts. When I wake up the next morning my snacks are over, my belly is bigger, my complexion is greasier, my house is a mess again and my migraine is worse. So I allow Randy.2 to give me the good slap I deserve, drink more coffee, clean the house again and call my thesis supervisor.

***

Absurd as it seems, he still remembers that I exist, and even seems to think that I am some kind of promise to the department. Which seems to me probable enough, only not because of my own unheard-of genius, but more likely because of the general lamentable level of the department itself. He says that I should not worry that much, I am only twenty-three, after all. Was it thirty-two? Oh. Still, he is ready to keep supervising me. No, he does not have a teaching position to offer me. Neither does he need a research assistant. Well, not precisely; there _might_ be something I could do for him. There is this world-famous researcher, _thirty-one_ years old, Dr. Harley Something, who kind of got out of sight lately, went on sabbatical and didn’t come back. Was investigating cults and such, there had been some silly rumors, but that’s nonsense. What is definitely true, is that he has been avoiding the academic circles lately, living in seclusion in his country house. Or some shit like that. But my supervisor was interested in his research, and thinks that the guy might agree to work with me for whatever reason. It is worth trying, he says. I might get a scholarship.

This story seems ridiculous, nothing fits. A world-famous researcher decides to get away from sadomasochistic peer review, from stupid children whose last trend is to be offended by literally fucking everything, from sucking rich people’s cocks to get grants (or whatever the process to get grants was, they explained it to me but I forgot), from secretaries with ugly nails, bitchy faces and uncannily tidy desks… That much I can get. But why would anyone assume that he will be convinced to come back by a nobody like _me_ , of all people? And then it hits me: the man is probably a known fag, and my supervisor is counting on my seducing powers. Well, now it all makes perfect sense, I do love solving puzzles. I hope that the guy is hot, at least.

***

They have managed to arrange me to meet this Harley-something today, which confirms my supposition that he is a fag, and that they convinced him by sending him my picture. So I get of the shower, shave my face, shave the rest of my body, and try to decide what is more suitable for an academic meeting: black jeans or non-black jeans. I opt for tight jeans. Then I put on a Rick and Morty t-shirt. I’ve never watched this show, but I hear that this is what the cool kids like those days. I know everything about being cool. I am cool.

I change to a regular t-shirt, look at the mirror and decide that I don’t look bad at all. I have long, straight, red hair, a cute face and faded blue, kind-of-adorably sleepy eyes. I _do_ look about twenty, the only thing that hints at my actual age being my brand-new belly; but then again, the acne makes for a convenient contrast effect. I sigh, apply some concealer, and them some blush over it. My lips I leave in their natural state, because they are already thick and rosy like that. I decide that I don’t only look “not bad at all,” but _totally cute_. Really, for an unemployed, middle-aged, failed writer, failed academic, fat, acne sufferer, PTSD sufferer, make-up applying, stoner, faggot _redhead_ , I am as successful as you get. I’m doing _fine_. I’m doing _great_ , in fact. I get out to see if my car haven’t been stolen yet.

***

The evening has almost fell when I arrive to Dr. Fag’s house. It is located in the middle of fucking nowhere, a total bonus for me because I hate places. The horizon is marked by blurry blue mountains, and I can hear the sounds of nature, like crickets and myself thinking, for example. The building itself is big and old and kind of awesome; I wonder if the House of Usher looked like that. Not that there is anything scary about it, but maybe the House of Usher just got bad PR. There is a garden which is kind of unkempt, but who has time for shit like gardening anyway, and also it’s nice because it gives this atmospheric ambience.

But I forget about all this the moment I see the _resident_ of the house. _Damn._ It is not that he’s fucking _gorgeous_ ; he _is_ , but that’s not the point. The point is just how _right_ he looks, how much “precisely what I’ve been looking for my whole life without realizing it” he looks. How much like a door he looks, in short.

We step inside and he is all nice to me, inviting me to sit at the kitchen table and have a drink. I look around and see that the room is beautiful and comfortable; a lot of wood and stone, very spacious and tidy, like the secretaries’ desks (but pleasantly so, unlike the desks); no artificial light yet, because there is still enough natural one entering from the bow windows. I wonder when does the guy have time to clean it so nicely; isn’t he supposed to be all busy getting famous for his research, only to later turn his back to academia and become some weirdo mystic, or whatever my supervisor was trying to hint at? And still, everyone likes him so much that they _bombard_ him with hot redheads just in order to tempt him to come back.

“You’re doing fine,” says Randi.2, “you’re doing _just fine_.”

I observe him as he brings the drinks. He has long, thick, curly black hair that I want to hide in. His body is a bit too skinny, but also like, all broad and angular and _deep_ ; deep hollow cheeks and deep dark green eyes. Pale skin, not rosy pale like mine; but very, very light brown, like he has some melanin inside but doesn’t go out in the sun much, because he’s _obviously_ too cool for the sun. I remember that he’s about a year younger than me. Unlike me, he does look his age, in subtle ways, like those very thin lines around his mouth, and a white hair or two. All the things that give you this really _wise_ vibe, this Galadriel-ish young-yet-ancient vibe, this “guy who has all the answers, who has been everywhere, who can surely take me back to the woods and palaces of my childhood dreams” vibe.

And… that’s usually the point where people ruin _everything_ by opening their _fucking mouths_ and starting to _talk_. But this guy does have some interesting things to say; while not “secrets of the universe” interesting – more like “humanities scholar” interesting – this is still much more than whatever you usually expect from people. He talks about scientific paradigms. He says: “in a normal state of affairs, we are simply unable to think outside of our current paradigm, right?”

“In a normal state of affairs, I’d say that you’re right. But paradigms _do_ change sometimes, so people must _somehow_ be able to think outside of them, at least once in a while.”

“Sure, but you’re getting ahead of me. Paradigms make research possible, but they also restrict us, they do not allow us to reach the truths which lie outside of them. And not only we _do_ know that there are truths lying outside of them, but we also know that in fact _all_ , or _at least_ most of our paradigms are wrong. You see, we always end up changing them, eventually, finding more accurate ones. That is how it has always been, and there is no reason to expect that the science made in our times is somehow privileged.”

“But what choice do we have, as academics? We can’t go around listening to every idiot with theories about astrology and ‘race realism’ just in order to break paradigms, right?”

“No, we neither can nor want. As I said, we need those paradigms. Paradigms are a double-edged sword. So what we do is, we take it slow. We behave, do ‘normal science’, prepare the ground; and then, once in a few generations, with the right combination of the ground having been rightly prepared and someone of enough genius appearing, a paradigm shift is made possible. Now, the reason that I am not in academia anymore, and that I am _not coming back_ , is…”

“And finally, _stupidity arrives_ ,” I think.

“That I don’t have time for all that. Life is too short, and there are too many secrets to discover, so I had to find a way around. And I _did_ find some interesting things.”

“Oh. So… quantum mechanics?”

He stares at me like I’m a total freak. “Wha – _what?!_ ” he finally manages to ask.

I think I like this guy.

We talk more and have more drinks, the talking gets less and less academic and I don’t give a fuck, we’re at bed at some point and it’s magical and dreamy, despite being so thin his body is so warm, I know because mine is pressed against it and what the hell are we drinking, his tongue feels so good in my mouth, almost as much as his hands gripping me by the hips while he fills my ass with his cock.

***

When I wake up next morning, I am inside a huge bed, in a room full of plants and books and interesting stuff. I feel… What is the word…? “ _Happy?_ ”

I get out the bed, stretch like a kitty and look for some clothes.

There is a really, really nice smell filling the kitchen, which looks pastel colored by the morning light. Harley is standing there, making those delicious looking pancakes, and I think how _unfair_ it is that someone will be so attractive in such a manly way, and will _also_ be able to cook. I guess that _he_ would never have gotten PTSD.

Anyway, I hug him from behind, and kiss his ear while attaching my waist to his. He turns to kiss me back, then says, “good morning, princess.” He _actually_ says that! I feel like my face is probably getting all red. I wonder what happens to the rest of your body when you blush, is there enough blood left for it, or _what?!_ That kind of worries me so I go sit on one of the couches, a cat I haven’t noticed before jumps on me asking to be caressed, purring once I do. I think: “I am home.”

I am finally, _finally_ _away_. Away from celebrities and politicians, from bosses and rent, from baseball and religion, from iPhones and T.V shows, from protests and bureaucracy, from pop music and rap music, from junk food and super food, from police violence and sexual violence and all the other violence, from quantum mechanics and people and all their _fucking noise_. God, so much noise.

Harley brings the pancakes to the table, together with chocolate syrup and orange juice. He smirks as he sits next to me, caresses my acne-stained cheek (all the concealer long gone), and tells me not to exaggerate with the chocolate syrup. Great, I don’t need Randi.2 anymore.

I smirk back, pour all what’s left in the bottle on my pancakes and start eating, as he shakes his head and smiles a cute “I hold the secrets of the universe, can fuck you like a machine, _and_ wake up before you to make you mind blowing pancakes” little smile.

I tell him, “I’m staying here, you know. _And_ , I’m paying rent with sex. _And_ , you have to keep calling me princess.”

“I thought you’d never say that,” he says, now with a huge smile.

He then tries pulling out some inexistent syrup from the now empty jar to add to his own pancakes, but fails. He frowns and adds: “ _Princess Randolph_.”

I give him the (slightly chocolate stained) finger.

“Randolph… What _kind of name_ is that, anyway?” he asks, “it sounds like the name of a guy _at least_ thirty-something.”

“I _am_ at least thirty-something.”

He raises a (sexy) eyebrow.

***

When we’re done eating, we have more amazing sex.

And when we’re done with _that_ , he says, “I have something to show you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The part about poor Randolph being all distressed that mean people dared to actually _like_ his novel is Howard's. Here:
>
>> His new novels were successful as his old ones had never been; and because he knew how empty they must be to please an empty herd, he burned them and ceased his writing.
>> 
>> –The Silver Key, H. P. Lovecraft


	2. Beware of Alhazred Induced Madness

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harley has broken bird syndrome, but hey, at least he is self aware!  
> Randolph likes cats and Microsoft Office. Also, he has nice legs.  
> The Miskatonic University has known better times.

It is certainly not something that I was planning or expecting, but it does appear that I have a boyfriend. The word “boyfriend,” while accurately describing Randolph’s role in my life, is both inappropriate and appropriate. Inappropriate, because it sounds less like something that I would have, and more like something that a hypothetical preadolescent daughter of mine would. Appropriate, because some of my first impressions of him, were that he was but a boy, and meant to be my friend.

The very fact that we met was improbable, since I neither wished for a partner at the time, nor was forced to participate in any social event since I left academia – and additional benefit of that decision. I actually do not know whether Randolph wished to have a partner or not, but I do know that I am an incredible social and outgoing person next to him (and this is merely the least of his oddities). So the circumstances of our meeting were not particularly exciting; that is, the university still not being ready to leave me alone. I had thought – hoped – that they had finally understood that I was not coming back, as a few months had already passed without me hearing from them. But, admittedly, I was not completely surprised when I did receive a call.

I was clinging to the hope that this was just to kindly let me know about some new bureaucratic issue which had arisen, probably sensing that everyone was too much at peace with the universe. But, unsurprisingly, they had not yet given up on me or my research. At least they had come up with a novel strategy, I give them that. They were not trying to make me go back personally anymore, but wanted me to at least transmit my unfinished research to someone else to work on. They had already found a so-called “adequate person”: a Master’s student from the Miskatonic, about whom my boss did not give me much details, yet reassured me that he was brilliant.

Needless to say, that was not reassuring... My research, which I had put years on – I could understand that they did not want it lost, but why delegate it to someone as unsuitable as a Master’s student from the fucking Miskatonic, no matter how “brilliant?” Perhaps I had been too generous in assessing my own value? Was my work so unimportant that they simply did not mind handing it to some kid? Or perhaps, was this some twisted attempt to apply reverse psychology on me? I took a deep breath. Knowing the boss, if everything else failed, he would not hesitate in resorting to disguised or undisguised threatening. I gained nothing by arguing; the best I could do was accept to have a meeting, which would surely give me more than enough reasons to decline the generous offer. I put one condition: it would be held in my house. Let Miskatonic-boy drive here, and see how much energy he still had left to plagiarize my work.

***

The appointed day arrived, and I firmly stood for the decision I had made not to dress appropriately nor make any kind of special preparations. I did make sure to have coffee and some tasteless, sugarless cookies, but that was it; no reason to make him feel at home. And yet… the very first impression he gave me, was that my choice of cargo pants and a faded sweater was the product of a serious underestimation of the “not dressing appropriately” concept. The boy in front of me was wearing tight jeans and a tight t-shirt, and his face was covered by a thick layer of makeup. It seemed as if he was trying very hard to look sweet, non-threatening, perhaps even pretty. I decided that he succeeded, and for the first time it occurred to me that this meeting might, at the end, be less unenjoyable than originally estimated.

I invited him in, sat him down, and gave him a very abstract version of why I had left the sweet embrace of academia. I chose to start with this particular topic just in case my decision was still not clear enough; and also in order to observe his reactions, since I was supposed to at least consider handing him my previous life work, and it gave me a way to assess both the quality of his mind, and its compatibility with my own. His responses were satisfactorily intelligent. For the most part, that is.

Other than that, I liked what I was seeing, and by that I do not mean his academic abilities, for I still did not have enough information to judge them. There was a certain something about Randolph, strange and fresh; something nonsensical about the words he chose. Not nonsensical in the usual, annoying manner, but in a rather clever one, as if the sense actually was there – somewhere – obeying a hidden logic. I could visualize his thoughts as fireworks inside the weird little brain; and from there to wanting to test his reaction to drunkenness, my way was short enough. His reaction to drunkenness was satisfying as well: very soon he was just giggling, all flushed as I dragged him to my bed.

***

Randolph’s personality is, as said, not devoid of oddities. He is simultaneously very sweet and very egoistical, yet there is no contrast between those two facets of him; they rather seem to complement each other, as there is some innocence about his egoism, which serves, in its turn, to make him even sweeter. I know for certain that many people would never had accepted half of his behaviors, and yet here I am, nursing this broken, ungrateful bird. I want to stress that it was not some juvenile fervor which prompted me to start this relationship, but the understanding that I was up to the task, together with the cold decision that it was worth it. Well, technically, he was the one to decide that he would be staying with me, but that was after I made sure to provide him with enough sex and attention; he had made as much of a choice to stay as one of his cats (about them – in a moment), after getting handed a huge bowl of milk.

This is the situation: for everything practical, my little princess is useless. It is unthinkable for him to cook, clean or wash clothes, and let’s not even start talking about fixing blinds or pipes, or offer to help me with whatever task I might be struggling with at the moment; that would had been altogether incoherent. But it is not completely true that he does not do anything; he does take care of the aforementioned cats. The one problem: before he arrived, I did not have cats. I had one kitten: my beautiful Siamese Luci. Imagine my surprise when I came home one day after being out for a while, and my ingenious Randolph announced me that Luci had dyed his fur black. After that, there are more, almost daily. Actually, I still do not have cats; I do not even have Luci anymore, since he, as the others, belongs now to Randolph. At least, he does indeed take care of them. He feeds them, applies flea repellent to them, takes them to the vet, spends evenings filling Excel tables with their ages, weights, blood types, feeding schedules, vaccination schedules and astrological signs. And when night arrives, he claims that he is exhausted and needs me to take care of him.

I do not mind that; why should I? It is not in Randolph’s nature to be useful, and yet his company is far from being unpleasant. Far from being unpleasant are all those nights he spends lying between my arms, allowing me to gently fondle his tender flesh, as he half asleep mutters “I love you, Harley.” That might be a fair price for the fact that the list of things which I do for him is gradually expanding, and now includes such tasks as shaving his legs. Usually, I am rewarded by afterwards having those long, white, now completely smooth legs wrapped around my body. It is nice, but it is also true that his rewards invariably involve me giving him pleasure in some way. The thing is, I do not recall when have I been as happy for the last time – “I love you, Harley.”

Yet his love is mixed with hate. Oh, nothing personal; he also hates himself, every other single person he’s ever met, and all the countless people that he will probably never meet. He is genetically designed to hate; and his hatred spreads even towards the realm of physical theories, for which reason – I dare not inquire. This all-encompassing hatred is somehow related to the fact that he finds it extremely offensive for people to like the one novel that he published. I had almost forgot about it, but I did read it during the time in which it had become popular. It was fun; a light satire, harmless but witty and gracefully structured, and I was pleased and a bit surprised to find out that he was the author. His gaze was venomous when I innocently told him that, as if I had inflicted some kind of physical harm to him. He did take a deep breath, as to calm himself down, as to remind himself that I was still a friend. I was just starting to know him enough to understand that according to his world view, he was giving me a great honor by doing that.

What I was most definitely surprised at, was the further discovery that Randolph used to be a soldier; he was with the U.N forces which were sent to Japan at the time of the Angel Attacks in 2015. That did not turn out very well in general, since conventional fighting was discovered to be ineffective against this non-human enemy; but also for Randolph as an individual, as he was declared psychologically unsuitable to serve, and sent home right after his first battle. Still, I cannot get rid of the feeling that this section of his biography simply does not fit with anything else about his person; not his hedonism, nor his intellectuality, nor his vulnerability. The point is not that I have ever considered that he might be lying, but that it makes him less predictable than what I would have thought him to be otherwise. Which, in a way, makes him even more interesting to me.

Of course, at least his vulnerability, might as well be caused by this experience. What I have no doubts about, is that it is somehow related to the fact that he sticks with me. I believe that he genuinely admires my mind and physical appearance, but there is something else: Randolph is in need of someone to protect him, and senses that I am both capable and willing to do that. Correctly, I must say.

***

Back in our first morning together, I did not know half of this, except maybe by instinct. In a sense, none of this matters. It has never mattered. As we lay together, as I held him against my chest, the closest and tightest that was physically possible, I felt the beatings of his heart, and thought, “sweet boy, never leave. Never leave, never leave, never leave,” and, “why wait, I will show you everything.” But at the end I did not show him everything; I managed to control myself, at least for the time being.

I am quite proud of my library, and I was pleased that Randolph seemed to like it as well. I actually have no idea whether it is true that the human eye can literally shine in excitement, but the moment we walked in, Randolph’s blue eyes did appear to me to acquire a diamond-like quality. I had him sat on a velvet couch next to my own, and told him about my old research (currently his research), which was primarily focused on a collection of seemingly unrelated testimonies, that I collectively came to denominate “the Cthulhu Mythos.” I told him about the cults, found across cultures, continents, eras, which worshiped an intricate set of… gods? demons? aliens? all of the above…? I admitted that I did not know, but I did know that the beings worshiped in the different cults were extremely similar; not only in their aspects and attributes, but also in their literal names. As I observed him to be properly fascinated, I decided that it was better to stop telling him, and start showing him the documents which I had gathered. I decided to include, to get started, Dyer’s account of the expedition to Antarctica in 1930, the anonymous traveler’s manuscript describing the trip to the nameless city, and Thurston’s detailed testimony of his investigations regarding the being named “the Great Cthulhu,” that I came to see as the soul of the whole “mythology.”

***

To finish covering the whole collection took him a few weeks, as it is not small. By then, he had some questions: Were those cults still active? How come he’d never heard anything about them? Were the town of Dunwich, the nameless city, and all the other places mentioned in the myths, real places? What about the gods/aliens/beings? Were they, by chance, related to the creatures denominated angels, who almost annihilated humanity about a decade ago? And the forbidden books, which were again and again mentioned in the texts, were they real? Was it true that they used to be freely available in the library of his own university to whoever might had wanted to read them? And what had become of them?

It was relatively easy to answer some of the questions: the cults were still alive, but it was extremely hard to find the members, and even harder to convince them to talk after you had found them. During the last few years I had done a pretty good job, but there was more work to do, which he would be expected to take on, if he was serious about taking over the project. Likewise, he would be expected to interview other witnesses. The locations were real, and I have visited all of them. He would also be expected to visit at least those that were within a reasonable distance. I did not know for sure about the mythological creatures, but there was a basis to consider that some of them might be related to the angels. I was pleased with him reaching this conclusion, and it would also be part of his job to investigate more. It was especially important for him to understand that in advance, because it could be emotionally complex, giving his past. He reassured me that the past was in the past, and he could not wait to start working.

Now, the books. I had been avoiding to think about my dilemma whether to tell him about them or not, but oh, did I want to. I made a quick decision, and fully admit that my judgement might had been clouded but my deep desire to share with him. I started by explaining him that they were definitely real, but that their existence was the subject of many contradictions. For a long time, his own university had indeed held copies of plenty of those books in its library, and it had not been the only one to do so. Officially, they were forbidden, but in reality it was ridiculously easy to get the permission to read them. All that changed after the time of the Impacts; suddenly they were never available, and eventually nobody talked about them anymore. Officially, all this was not a secret, yet it was suspiciously unknown among the general public. Officially, they had been destroyed, as it was decided that it was too dangerous for people to read them. But it was rumored that at least some of them were still intact, locked away and hidden from everywhere but a selected group. And according to yet another theory, some of the tomes had been spared by being secretly sold in times of economic crises.

We both agreed that the second rumor was not to be taken seriously, as it sounded like wishful thinking more than anything. But to me, the first one seemed quite plausible. Surprisingly, Randolph was a firm believer of the official version. He claimed that humans, invariably, aimed to get control over the actions of other, less powerful humans, with the pretext of protecting them; and that this tendency only got worse as time passed. The Great Wars at the beginning of the former century, he said, had served as an excuse to make some radical changes. The Impacts at the beginning of our own century, had been the ideal pretext to take the mass control even further. I pointed to the fact that if some small group was aiming to dominate – or did already dominate – the rest of the population, then it did not make sense for them to destroy any item which could had given them power, when they could as easily keep it hidden.

Randolph said that I had misunderstood: those people’s aim to control was not a positive but a negative one; meaning, they were not interested in achieving more power for themselves, but of reducing the general power of humanity as a whole, by slowly and steadily making everyone completely impotent. I asked why would anyone want it, and he said that I was mistaken in trying to attribute a rational reason to what he called a “perversion.” “It is a bug in our design,” he told me. “we cannot avoid leading ourselves to self-destruction.”

Unfortunately, I cannot bring myself to claim that Randolph’s pessimistic view of humanity is necessarily mistaken; while I do think that it is probably too extreme, it is not devoid of logic. We are, after all, just evolution’s puppets, and all that crap. Yet, I certainly cannot deny that all this talk should had served me as a warning that his mental stability was not to be toyed with. No matter what excuses I gave myself for finally showing him the books – it would promote our research, his career, probably my own private research, as I was sure that he would be willing to help (as long as it would not require him to get his pretty hands dirty) – at the end, my true motive was loneliness. It was very good to have him right next to me, to embrace him, to find him distractedly touching me at random times, to loss myself between his thighs every night; and still, I wanted more.

***

His reaction to seeing my copy of the Necronomicon was not really surprising, but it did scare me. It still does, actually. He started behaving uncharacteristically still and quiet, unlike his usual, restless self, and spending a lot of time devouring pages with a fanatic’s fascination. I am, of course, aware of the famous claim that reading the book causes insanity, but I had always assumed that it was an empty claim, as I had found that the records of actual people who had gone mad after reading it were way too rare to infer any kind of correlation. Now, I was starting to think that perhaps I had missed something; perhaps I had not looked carefully enough after all. For the possibility still remained, that while reading the book could not create a mental condition out of nowhere, it could significantly increase it in subjects where it already existed to a degree.

For all my genuine sympathy and appreciation to Randolph, he was not fully stable, and was ready enough to admit so himself; he claimed to have undiagnosed PTSD, and in some of his moods, to be a drug addict. I did not know whether there was any truth to those claims; I had not perceived in him any symptom of either of the conditions, but I was far from being an expert. Still, in my opinion it was more probable that he suffered from some relatively mild form of depression or anxiety. The problem was, that as far as I knew, that could be enough to allow Alhazred induced madness to happen.

So yes, it might had been a mistake to show him the book. And yet, once I did give it to him, it definitely did not seem like a good idea to take it back. In his view, he had found a purpose, and I feared that to lose it would be even more potentially prejudicial for his mental health than whatever madness might hypothetically be caused by doing some reading. Besides, I knew with certainty that he would hate me, and the mere thought was unbearable. Anyway, I trusted Randolph; with all his quirks, he was responsible and a good researcher. Or so I thought.

***

“Randolph, you can’t just fake your interviews!” I find myself yelling at him. Sometimes he truly exasperates me.

“Why not? That’s how I always do my research. I also fake the statistical data,” he explains to me calmly, like he was talking to an unreasonable child.

I try to keep my cool, “no you don’t, your professors would had noticed. Back when I was teaching, I had a couple of idiots who tried to do that. Believe me, I would need to be completely incompetent not to notice.”

He looks at me with a triumphant smile, “And here you’ve answered yourself. Twice.”

I stare at him.

He sighs, and probably interprets my incredulity as confusion, because he keeps talking to me like I was some kind of retarded, “it is the idiots that you caught. And you might had not caught them if you were incompetent. I am not an idiot and nobody said that my professors were not incompetents. Anyway, if you still not believe me, I can show my seminars. You can go knock on those inexistent people’s inexistent doors, and see for yourself that they don’t fucking exist.”

“Just yesterday you spent at least an hour elaborating the case of why, exactly, you are an idiot. You were using a PowerPoint presentation.”

“Well that was yesterday. People change over time.”

I give up. Of course, he is not an idiot. What he is, I remind myself, is a published novelist; so while for me it seems much more troublesome to make up data than obtain it the usual way, perhaps it is not the same for him. Besides, what do I know; perhaps the Miskatonic does hire incompetents after all. “But why?” I ask, “weren’t you there in the first place because you wanted to acquire knowledge?”

“I did want knowledge, so that’s why I wanted to be done with the seminars as soon as possible so I could go do actual research.”

“Well, now you can do actual research, so what’s the problem?”

“There’s no fucking problem. But I have Alhazred now,” he smiles dreamily and caresses the tome with a sensuality which... Fuck, I can’t believe that I am being jealous of a book. “Why waste time interviewing some stupid witness if I have the real thing?” he asks.

I think that for starters, because he is being paid to do this research, but that would not have convinced him. I highly prefer not to threaten to take the forbidden books from him, because this is not a threat that I would actually fulfill. I give up reasoning and try guilt tripping instead. I tell him that I love him, that I am worried about him, that I don’t want the occult studies to occupy all his time and fully consume him. At the end, I resort to bribe him with fucking homemade pasta, and he reluctantly agrees to move his fat ass and go interview Ikari Shinji.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Randolph sounds like me writing text messages, and Harley like me writing university papers. Although just looked at the first draft of this chapter, and Harley sounded much more like Randolph there. Here's an extract:
> 
> "So Basically, he has a bunch of feline cats, and I have one human one. That I can fuck. I don’t complain."  
> :>


	3. The Night’s Plutonian Shore

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Finally some Evangelion, if someone is still reading this and was wondering.  
> Title taken from The Raven by Edgar Allan Poe.  
> Enjoy my attempt at being nightmarish:>

Sometimes, we know ourselves to be but animals, that feel, and live, and dream. Sometimes, dreams seem to us like an extension of vigil. In my dream, it was all blue: the sky was blue, the sea was blue, your eyes were blue. You were beautiful, and you were mine. I sang you a song of joy; but you could only sing of agony, of being cast away from your tribe. I would represent your mind in mine as a precious figure of glass, forgotten to mankind, left in the dessert, at the mercy of nature for the ages to come; and I wanted to offer you shelter inside my heart. In my dream, we were attacked, you and I, and all our tribe; alien forces came to rob our land, so you and I were sent to the battlefield. But it was I – I was your enemy, assigned to take your land and life. I could not hurt you, love, so I made a sacrifice: instead of shelter, I offered you my life, so that yours would be spared.

Instead of dying, I woke up here. Here, it is the color of raw meat. It is cold, yet my feet burn, as the floor is stained with boiling tears. My back hurts, and I would love to lean it on the walls. But the space is too vast, and I’m unable to reach the walls. And if I could, it would have hurt me even more; for they are not made of cement or bricks, but of shattered thorns and bleeding cells. There is no light, yet my vision is clear, so I can see this vast – this endless – space. I can see the creatures which surround me, and tell that they look wrong; their faces are not faces, their irises are yellow, and their limbs are upside down. I do not know if they distinguish between organic matter and otherwise. I do know that their language is transmitted by a channel different than sound.

All this – this is no chance. This wide landscape – this is my prison, and I am meant to be in pain. I am being judged, for I have failed; I have betrayed my race. But I’m still dazed from the dream – not a dream? I ask, in soundless speech. Not a dream, they reply in the same manner. I ask them more: are you alive? You are; an empty shell. Why did I not die? The body that you killed, was not my body; I could not die while inhabiting it. I this my body? Yes. What am I? I am like my judges; a member of their race, which I’ve betrayed. Could you love me again? Not in this shape. Will I have another? No. Was my sacrifice in vain? Yes. Will I have a second chance? No. Will I be punished? Yes. By death? No. What will happen to me, will I leave this hell? Yes. Where to? To another hell. To earth? Yes.


	4. The Health Freaks’ Strategy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> More fun Randolph-Harley interactions.

I wake up in a sunny room, and realize that it’s fucking late. I wash the numbness out of my face and wonder why haven’t Harley kicked my lazy ass out of bed already, as I myself am always thrilled whenever a proper excuse to kick someone presents itself (unfortunately, those are far from presenting themselves often enough, those days). But my man is very different from me in many aspects, so it is not like I understand half of his motives, anyway.

The kitchen smells pleasantly like toast, yet is sadly devoid of toast. Harley is still sitting there, instead of being working as he should (such a lazy fuck, at this pace he’ll be like me). On the table, next to him, are a cup of coffee and a plate full of crumbs. He is reading a book and sipping from the coffee, wearing a hideous sweater and sexy reading glasses. He notices me, but pretends not to. I reach to him, kiss the back of his neck, aspire the metallic perfume on his fine backbone, put my hands under his sweater and all over the slender, functional line of his waist. I keep touching him and smelling him for like a minute, until he decides to acknowledge my existence and pull me away. “Good morning to you too,” he says.

I manage to sneak and give him one more kiss. “Good morning, bitch,” I answer.

He gives me a quick kiss as well, and a “good morning, idiot.”

The “good morning” is redundant, since he has already said it, and I suspect that it is merely an excuse for the “idiot.”

“You ate my toasts,” I inform him.

“Make yourself more toasts. Do you know how to use the toaster, or need me to show you?”

I ignore this particular insult and make the toasts. I spread butter on both of them, add salt to one an sugar to the other, as a dessert. I ignore the look on Harley’s face. I also make myself coffee, and once everything is ready I sit next to him, lean my long legs over his and proceed to nourish myself.

I am just in the middle of enjoying the bliss of the situation when he asks, “Randolph, love, have you considered that cutting with the coffee could be of some help?”

I was not prepared for this. I almost choke, but I somehow manage not to and ask, “and where the fuck am I supposed to get my will to live from?”

“Drink tea or something?”

Then I understand. “I can see where you’re going with this. I know you people’s strategy”

“Which strate… where am I going with this?”

“First, you tell me that drugs are bad…”

“I’ve never told you…”

“Shut up. You tell me that drugs are bad, except for weed, weed is OK. But only the weed they had back in the sixties, because the weed they have now is all _genetically engineered…_ ”

“Randolph, where _the fuck_ do you get those ideas fro…”

“Don’t interrupt me. So I can’t smoke the weed that exists now, and I _also_ can’t smoke the weed that existed back in the sixties, because we’re not back in the sixties, and time has this way of being chronological, so I’m stuck with drinking coffee. But coffee contains caffeine, caffeine makes me happy, and happy equals bad in you all health freaks’ _moralistic little world_ , which means that I must switch to decaffeinated coffee. Then, it turns out, in order to take the caffeine away, they put chemicals on it, so it’s also bad, and I have to switch to tea, that as every _toddler_ knows, contains _no chemicals whatsoever_ ; in fact it is a fully mysterious, _unexplored_ territory to the science of chemistry. But then it is revealed that it also contains caffeine. You would think that green tea is fine, right? _Wrong_ , because _apparently_ it also has caffeine, which means that I can only drink the herbal one, but not the commercial kind with the _insecticide_ , oh no, what you mean is the natural kind with the _insects_ , that I grow in _my own_ fucking garden. And if I don’t _feel like_ growing fucking tea in my own garden, I should just _suck it_ and drink water. Not sink water, because it has chlorine, and not bottled water because it does things to the environment. So before I notice, I am only allowed to drink _bleach_. But _now_ , bleach is _also bad_ , because it contains…”

“You know what? I think that’s actually a great idea, you should go drink some bleach now.”

“Yes, I do believe you’re right.”

”I just wanted you to sleep better.”

“I slept from 5 in the morning until noon, I sleep just fine.”

“Right. We could get you a filter, if you’re worried about the water.”

“Shut up.”

“What where you doing until 5 in the morning, anyway?”

“Binge watching porn.”

“Doing _what?!”_

“Binge watching porn. Binge watch means to…”

“I know what ‘binge watch’ means, idiot. You can’t binge watch porn.”

“I’ve noticed that you have this trend: I speak about doing something, and you say that this thing can’t be done, and that I’m an idiot for thinking that I can do it. Only it is always _after I’ve already_ done the thing. And _I’m_ the idiot.”

“Well, _idiot_ , what I usually mean is not that those things _literally_ cannot be done, but that _you must be an idiot in order to do them._ Which I guess that yes, it does mean that _I’m_ the idiot, for even _trying t_ o have this conversation with you.”

He calls me “idiot” a lot lately (not even “princess idiot,” like he did for a while), but this morning he's exaggerating a bit and it’s starting to get offensive, so I decide to change the topic. I ask him, “Harley, why don’t you ever fuck me with your glasses on?”

That probably surprises him, because he stares at me for a few seconds before saying, “I don’t know, you never mentioned you wanted me to.”

“Because I had never thought about it before, but then I noticed than in porn, wearing glasses during the intercourse increases the sexiness, according to my calculations, by a percentage of…”

“Why _the fuck_ do you keep watching porn after you have already come?!” he yells at me. Seriously, yells. Like if this particular thought had been weighing on his chest until it was just too much to bear.

“ _Come?_ Harley, I don’t _masturbate_ when I’m watching porn, that’s just _gross_. Besides, I thought you said that I should have other hobbies beside obsessing over occult sciences because it’s not good for my mental health or something.”

“Well, you do seem cheerful today,” and he goes back to drink his coffee and not care if I’m alive or dead. Or pretend that he doesn’t care, I can never tell them apart. He pretends that well.

I have an idea, “Harley, _you_ should do porn!”

“ _What?!_ ”

“Seriously, Harley, you are so beautiful, you should!” I’m getting all excited with my idea. “I would watch all your videos,” I encourage him.

“Randolph, you’re an idiot,” he says in the tone of voice that a doctor would use to announce that I have some terminal illness.

And I’m just taking mental note of this as a possible plot for a video, when Shubb Nigurath arrives from the cats’ dimension, climbs over me and starts meowing.

I politely tell her “good morning, Shubb Niggurath,” and kiss her on the nose. “Harley, why do you never kiss me on the nos…” I start asking.

“You… what did you just call the cat?” he interrupts me.

“Shubb Nigurath, I’ve changed all the cats names last night! I’ve emailed them to you, didn’t you see?”

“I see you’ve been productive last night, what would you do without your coffee…” he sighs, “Randolph, I thought that you were trying to be less obsessed with the occult.”

His voice is softer when he says that, and he seems to be actually concerned, to actually care if I’m alive or dead. Or maybe he just pretends that well. One way or another, it does give me a rush of dopamine, and I get closer in order to get more attention. It works. I lean my head on the table and he starts running his fingers through my hair. I wish that it would last forever.

It lasts for a couple of minutes, and then he asks, “you do remember that you are supposed to do the interview today, right?”

I slap myself on the forehead and mumble a “shit.” I’ve been repressing that, but _now_ I remember. Thank you, Harley.

I get up, ignore Shubb Nigurath’s angry meow, and sit on his lap. He wraps his arms around me and asks if I am sure that I’m ready to do that. After he’s been such a pain to convince me.

I tell him that not quite, but a good blowjob would definitely help.

***

Usually Randolph wakes up shortly after me, but this morning he oversleeps. He is supposed to interview the Japanese pilot today, a task that he’d been quite nervous about. I have pushed him into it, but I’m starting to get second thoughts. Maybe it is not a good idea, given his past. Maybe it could trigger his real or imaginary PTSD, or whatever the matter is with him. But at the end of the day, it is up to him, and after all he can still cancel if he wants. The guy is hospitalized in a mental institution, it is not as if he had such a busy schedule. At any rate, the interview is only at the afternoon, so I let Randolph sleep. I finish my breakfast, but find that I am myself too nervous to start working, so I wait for him in the kitchen.

When he finally wakes up, he is in one of his specially uneasy moods, chatty in a compulsive, somewhat annoying way, like a child that desperately wants attention but does not know a better way to get it. As always, it works; I get engaged with his nonsense, and before I notice, he is curled over my lap, somehow managing to make himself appear helpless, almost physically smaller. And still, there is a sweetness to the moment. His body against my own is soft, warm and full of life. It feels very simple and comforting; I think about all the years spent without this sort of intimacy. Of course, he ruins it by proposing to have sex, probably with the intention to accidentally miss the appointment. This earns him a pinch, which he probably sees more as a consolation prize than anything else, being the little masochist he is.

He gets a shower. I refuse to enter with him because then we would had ended up having sex. Instead, I use the time to pick some nice clothes for him, which surprisingly do exist somewhere between the ocean of slutty ones that now occupy more space than I used to thinks existed in the closet (he does have this tendency to defy physics). When he’s done showering and dressing, I dry his long, thick hair; watch it becoming a brighter shade of red as the water evaporates, little drops of sweet smelling sweat appearing over his skin as the it is hit by hot air. Once dry, I make it into a nice braid; neat, but not too tight. He wants to try my new cologne, which is not the one that I would pick for him, but I still pour some of it over his neck and temples. It goes go well with him, as everything does. Not that it really matters, I suppose that there is no real need to get all fancy in order to go interview some poor mad boy. I just enjoy helping him groom, it is relaxing for both of us. I also offer to drive him, but he says that he will be fine, sometimes he lets himself be led by his social anxiety a bit, this is just a small task, and it is pointless for me to waste my time on it as well. Having said all that, he gives me a kiss, allows me to hug him for a few seconds, and leaves.

***

As I enter into the car, I kind of get out of stupid mode, which means back into sad mode, because those are the only modes I have, really. Those and stupid-and-sad mode, of course. I try to reflect on why does this situation distress me so much. Is it because of the mental hospital? That would be the obvious explanation, I have always been afraid of those. Since I learned what mental institutions are, I assumed that I would be in one, some day. Surprisingly enough, it had not happened, yet. Call it “survival instinct.” The couple of nights after the army incident don’t count. I was as quiet as possible without being obviously uncooperative, this way I avoided being diagnosed. I probably do have PTSD, as well as other issues, and that was probably what they thought as well. But I just didn’t give them enough information to confirm it, to give me the freak seal. I am _already_ a freak, what good would it do to me to have a seal?

Perhaps I _should_ had listened to Harley, and stayed at home (after all the effort he had put in convincing me to go). But I would had taken the day of, and made him to do the same. Not to have sex, I am not in the mood for that anymore. But we would cuddle and I would show him anime, so his mind would explode and it would be funny; we would probably still be finding pieces around the house for like a month. Or the cats would chase them an eat them, or something. Happy thoughts aside, I am slightly pissed. If I had been steadfast in my refusal, he would had got to call me lazy. This way, when I come back home scarred for life, he gets to say “told you so.” Bitch.

“ _’Scarred for life…’_ are you sure you are exaggerating _enough?_ Wouldn’t ‘wake up in a bathtub full of ice with a kidney missing ’ cover the possible effects of _doing a fucking interview_ marginally better?” asks Randy.2. It’s been a while, actually. That’s one segment of my consciousness I had not missed. Fuck, I am depressed.

But maybe it is _not_ about the hospital, maybe it is just about getting out. After all, I’ve hiding in Harley’s awesome country house for a few months now. It has just been too tempting. I’ve been back at my old apartment one time to take away my stuff, and then one time to take care of some stupid formalities. Since then, the furthest I would go was to the village nearby, that was about half an hour driving, mostly for shopping or to take the cats to the vet. Harley’s house is really fucking isolated, which is awesome. He also has no T.V, which means far less mind numbing stupidity than in other places. I still have the internet’s stupidity and my own stupidity, harder to run away from those, but it is still an improvement.

Yet another awesome thing is that Harley also doesn’t have a lot of friends, like me. Or maybe he does, but he almost never talks about them, so I don’t care. Myself, I’ve stopped answering all of my friends’ calls since I moved with him. Not that those last years they had bothered to call so much, anyway.

I cannot really be angry at Harley, obviously. I can’t look at him for more than a minute – I can’t even think about him – without _fucking melting._ One of his friends did come visit once. I was so nervous, so afraid of embarrassing him. I wanted to hide and sleep the whole time, or maybe go somewhere else, but he said that he would love it if I would stay. So I stayed, and I was _nice_. I spoke as little as possible, because everything that comes out of my mouth is potentially embarrassing; but I was also polite, and uttered banalities at the right times. When the guy finally left, I was so afraid of having fucked up and that Harley would be mad at me. But he was just grateful to me for having put up with this even thought I didn’t want to, so he cooked me a second wonderful dinner, fucked me like crazy, and hugged me the whole fucking night. I feel a little better as I remember this. Fuck I am needy. I feel simultaneously good because of the comforting memory, and bad because I’m so fucking needy that I need this to feel good.

I realize that while lost in thought, I have arrived at my stupid destination.


End file.
